


Love Letters Straight From The Heart

by Camelittle



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Breaking Up & Making Up, Getting Back Together, Grieving, Love Letters, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Prior Minor Character Death, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-26
Updated: 2016-02-26
Packaged: 2018-05-23 08:46:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6111254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Camelittle/pseuds/Camelittle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After seven (mostly) blissful years, their relationship is finished, and Merlin tells himself he's over the clotpoll. But then he finds a box of Arthur's old love letters, stashed at the back of the cupboard. When the box is finally opened, secrets spill out. Secrets that maybe should have been aired a long time ago.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Letters Straight From The Heart

**Author's Note:**

> In memory of Texasfandoodler. Rest in peace, sweet Tex.  
> Written for the February 2016 Merlin Writers LJ Community theme: Secrets

**Love letters straight from your heart**

By Camelittle

*

 

> _Love letters straight from your heart_
> 
> _Keep us so near while apart_
> 
> _I'm not alone in the night_
> 
> _When I can have all the love you write_
> 
> _I memorize ev'ry line_
> 
> _I kiss the name that you sign_
> 
> _And darlin’, then I read again right from the start_
> 
> _Love letters straight from your heart_

 

*

Finally the room was bare. Cold, empty and bleached clean, like Merlin’s heart. All traces of its previous occupant erased. A blank canvas, ready for the next person to imprint.

Merlin told himself it was for the best, that he liked it that way, and for a moment he almost believed it.

“Merlin? I’m off!” Gwaine’s voice echoed up the wooden stairs. “I’ve got everything.”

“Thanks Gwaine.” Merlin stood up, his arse sore from sitting on the bare wood, and pulled open the door. “I owe you big time.” So did Arthur, he added silently, not wanting to say his ex’s name out loud.

“That’s what friends are for,” said Gwaine with a sympathetic grin. He flipped his hair over and then bent to pick up the final bag of Arthur’s stuff. “Any last-minute messages for the princess?”

“Nope,” said Merlin firmly. What more was there to say? The hollow, empty feeling in his throat would ease with time.

“Suit yourself then.” With his free hand, Gwaine reached for the door handle and twisted it, carrying the remnants of Merlin and Arthur’s relationship in a cheap, Adidas knock-off holdall that Arthur had picked up on a business trip to Thailand. “See ya.”

When the front door clicked gently closed, Merlin turned back to the room that they had shared, he and Arthur. The room that had once echoed with passion and laughter, but had now fallen silent. On impulse, he stepped in, checking the built-in wardrobe one more time. And it was only then that he saw it, towards the back of a high shelf, almost out of sight. A shoebox.

Curious, he stood on tiptoe and reached for it. Through the dust that clouded the top, the letters of Arthur’s name peeped through, penned in a childish hand in brightly coloured marker pens, red, green and blue.

_Arthur Pendragon Age 5 ½_

The writing was firm and strong, but the letter p was the wrong way round, and something about that made Merlin’s throat constrict for a moment until he could barely breathe. Bloody Arthur. Tamping down these unwanted feelings that threatened to unbalance the equilibrium he’d fought so hard for, he closed his eyes for a moment.

Some sort of childhood memento, then. Sod it. Now he’d have to call Gwaine back, as if Merlin wasn’t feeling guilty enough about imposing on him already. Arthur sodding Pendragon. A wave of resentment crashed over him, making his teeth grind together and his jaw tense. Blinking, he pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off the inevitable headache.

 _Come on, Merlin,_ he thought. _You’ve done great so far, acting chatty and normal even though that arrogant, entitled prat left you to do all the fucking packing, and sent Gwaine to pick up his fucking things so he wouldn’t have to see you, and sometimes the fact that Arthur can’t bear to look at you, that he won’t even speak to you any more, it all makes you bite your lip so hard that it bleeds just to stop it from trembling. Come on. You can do it. Just one more box of stuff and then you can forget about the arrogant, cold-hearted, self-righteous bastard forever._

Digging in his pocket, he pulled out his phone and selected Gwaine’s number. But as he suspected, Gwaine didn’t want to come all the way back just for a shoebox full of Arthur’s old school stuff.

“Nah, mate, I’m half way to Archway for fuck’s sake. Don’t fancy coming back, now,” yelled Gwaine over the bass-heavy beat of his car stereo. “Just burn the bloody thing. The princess won’t even notice.”

“Yeah. All right, mate. Sorry to bother you.” Merlin ended the call and stared at the shoebox, as if he could set fire to it by virtue of the intensity of his gaze alone. “Crap,” he added.

The box had obviously originally held a pair of ladies boots –- not the kinky sort, but the everyday sort, like the ones that Merlin’s mum wore to work in the winter time, with sturdy heels and a zip up the side. Not cheap ones from Marks and Spencer, though, like his mum’s.

Merlin wondered who in Arthur’s household would wear boots like that. Maybe Arthur was a closet cross-dresser? No, if Arthur had been a cross-dresser he’d definitely have worn patent-leather high-heeled boots which laced up to the thigh. The thought raised a rueful smile, but his curiosity was piqued. And anyway, it was not as if he could really burn it in here – not in a top-floor flat with under-floor heating. He should probably recycle the contents.

Decision made, telling himself it was in the interests of the environment to sort out the junk before recycling, he leaned forward and flipped up the lid of the box.

But he’d only managed to catch a quick glimpse of a jumble of letters, opened but in their envelopes, and an old-fashioned blank cassette tape, when the doorbell rang to herald his mum’s arrival – ten minutes early.

On an impulse, he closed the box and tucked it under his arm before heading off down the stairs to answer the door and put London – and Arthur Sodding Pratdragon – behind him forever.

*

There’s something rather demoralising about having to move back in with your mum at the age of thirty, because of a failed relationship. Merlin knew he wasn’t alone, of course. Thousands of men his age were living with their parents these days. Even a modest flat like the one he’d shared with Arthur in an unkempt part of Camden was way beyond the means of most people – and it had only been because of their combined income as a junior doctor and a barrister that they could cover their outgoings. Still, Ealdor General Hospital was as desperate for accident and emergency doctors as UCH, so at least he would have a job to go to. And staying at his mum’s, perhaps he could save up enough for a mortgage down-payment on a flat in Cardiff or something.

He gazed out of his mum’s patriotic Mini Cooper, heart sinking at the sight of her red brick semi-detached cottage. The ivy that rambled over the porch was thicker than he remembered, tendrils of it groping towards the roof, and the paint was peeling on the window ledges. The delipidation of the house mirrored his mood, and he let out a heart-felt sigh.

“It won’t be for long, love,” said his mum, patting his hand and then reaching for the car door. She knew him too well. “You’ll be out of here before you know it, and gorgeous fellas will be beating a path to your door.”

“Yeah,” he replied, getting out and slamming the door behind him. “I know.” But he didn’t want gorgeous fellas beating down his door. He just wanted to be left alone to lick his wounds.

He rapidly squashed the silent, irrational part of him that desired Arthur to be the one beating a path to his door. That way madness lay.

With an air of finality, he opened up the boot of the Mini and grabbed the handle of his suitcase. He kept his eyes carefully trained on the huge Welsh dragon that adorned its roof, and ignored the pang of regret that assaulted him when his eyes unwittingly fell on the bumper sticker which declared “Whinny if you love dragons”. It was his mum’s car, and if she chose to keep a memento of Arthur in her life that was her prerogative.

It only took ten minutes to unload the car – and the last thing he brought in was Arthur’s half-forgotten box, which he took up to his room and tucked into the bottom of his wardrobe, thinking to take it down the garden for burning later. But then the doorbell rang, and Will was there. So he tossed a bundle of old hoodies on top of the box and forgot his troubles for a while.

*

That fateful night, two months ago, when Arthur had turned his back on Merlin forever, he had said that he never wanted to see Merlin’s (stupid) face again or hear his (horrible) voice. Which is why, when when the guitar riff from the start of Elvis’s “One night with you” rang out in the middle of the night, Merlin thought at first that he must be dreaming.

He’d fully intended to erase Arthur from his contacts list, but whether by sheer negligence or by some subconscious sentiment he was still there. And of course, the arrogant prat would have programmed Elvis as his ringtone.

Groping for the bloody phone, eyelids still firmly pressed closed, Merlin thought for a split second about ignoring it. But knowing Arthur he’d ring up Merlin’s mum instead. Probably best to answer it, just to get the prat off his back. He opened his eyes with a groan, and stared at the laughing picture of Arthur on his screen, the pulsing lights stating “The King”. Typical fucking Arthur. Fighting an urge to throw his phone at the wall, Merlin pressed “answer”.

“Yeah? Arthur? What is it?” he said, in a rough whisper.

“Merlin. You sound terrible. Have you got a cold?”

“I was asleep.” Merlin couldn’t help it. His voice rose a couple of octaves. “It’s two o’clock in the fucking morning, you selfish, unprincipled twat. I’m on earlies, this had better be good.”

“You’ve gone all Welsh.” Arthur’s voice blurred a little, as if he’d been drinking. “I suppose it was inevitable, with you moving back to sheep-shagger land.”

“Does this phone call have a point, or are you just pissed and keeping me awake to insult me and decrease my patients’ chances of survival?” Merlin hissed through his teeth. “Because I’ve half a mind to just bar all your calls from now on and put it on silent.”

“No. Wait. Look.” Arthur cleared his throat. “I just— look. Gwaine said you found a box of letters?”

“Those? Oh, yeah. I’d forgotten.”

“Yeah. Those. Well, I. Erm. Well, look, he said you were going to burn them. I’m— well. Just don’t. Please? I’ll come and get them.”

“Seriously? I thought, that, and I quote, ‘if you ever had to see my pasty little face again, you’d vomit’,” said Merlin, swallowing, because the memory still hurt, even now, weeks later. “And—”

“All right, I know.” Arthur sighed, making the phone crackle. “Look. Well. Please, just keep the letters for me. Please?”

“Wow. Two pleases. That’s unlike you. What does it contain, love letters? I’m of a mind to have a look for myself.”

“Don’t! It’s private.” A note of panic entered Arthur’s voice. “Please. Look, I’ll come down at the weekend. You don’t need to see me, just leave them with your mother. Just – don’t destroy them. Please.”

“Fine,” said Merlin, coldly, his chest constricting as he spoke. So Arthur still couldn’t bear to look at him. It was probably for the best. His skin felt clammy and his breath came in stutters, and he was humiliated by the power that Arthur’s voice still had over him, making his treacherous pulse rise. Just imagine how unsettling it would be to actually see the prat. No, Merlin should make himself scarce. “I’ll make sure that I’m out.”

“Please do.”

“You can count on it.”

“Fine.” Arthur paused, his breaths gusting against the phone, before adding, in a softer voice, “Goodbye, Merlin.”

“Goodbye Arthur.” Merlin swallowed, finger poised for a moment, and then ended the call.

The next day, when the alarm dragged him, blinking, from his fitful sleep, his gaze fell upon the pile of old clothes in his half-open wardrobe, still bundled over the box of letters. A wave of resentment flooded over him. Seven years, he and Arthur had been together. Seven mostly blissful years, except towards the end when they could barely look at each other without snarling and sniping. So how come, having erased everything of Merlin from his life, Arthur still held on to this sentimental childhood attachment? Just who could it be that meant so much to Arthur that he was willing to sacrifice a full day of his time to pick this box up in person? Try as he might, Merlin couldn’t remember Arthur speaking too fondly of any of his exes, with the possible exception of Gwen, but he knew Gwen’s handwriting and this box did not contain letters from her.

Well, fuck it. Merlin would be lying if he said he wasn’t curious, but at the same time he didn’t want to know. Let Arthur keep his fucking secrets. He meant nothing to Merlin, now.

*

Merlin had tried to put Arthur out of his mind, he really had. And on a long shift he could. When the trolleys and gurneys were filled with people who were in pain and terrified, he was fine. His countrymen and women needed him, and he was doing what he did best when he comforted them, reassured them, patched them up and advised them. Yes, he was fine when he was working. But at home things were different. Lying in bed, grasping for the sleep that eluded him, his pulse would suddenly race and his mind would start following it, down paths that led only to regret and dark questions. All that week, he stayed late at the hospital, volunteered to cover when other staff were unavailable, knowing that he couldn’t keep up this pace forever, but grateful for the distraction.

On Friday night, Freya had called in sick, so Merlin had worked through the night and into the following day. And so, when Gaius finally shooed him out of the hospital on Saturday afternoon, it was already getting dark outside again, and exhaustion dragged at his limbs. Pushing open the door, the scent of an old-fashioned cottage pie, mingled with cabbage wafted out. It had always been Arthur’s favourite dinner of his mother’s. A sudden ache clutched at his stomach that was nothing to do with hunger.

“Mum?” he yelled, hanging up his coat and toeing off his shoes. He pulled open the door to the kitchen. “I’m just going to jump in the sh— what the fuck is he doing here?”

“Language, Merlin!” scolded Mum, fixing him with one of her most disapproving looks. Which, given how he’d just spent the last eighteen plus hours, was beyond unfair. “I invited him in. It is my home after all. Poor boy had been driving for hours, and we couldn’t find his shoebox anywhere so we thought we’d wait for you to arrive. More bara brith, Arthur?”

“No thanks, Hunith.” Arthur gulped his tea and stood up. “I’d better be off. I’ll just take my box, and go, if that’s all right with you. Before Merlin burns a hole in my face with his glare.”

“I am not. Glaring!” said Merlin, slamming the kitchen door closed with a crash that made his mother flinch, and well she might. Inviting the git in like that. Giving him dinner. She’d always liked Arthur, it was the whole “ _poor motherless bachgen_ ” thing that he had going on. “Is there any dinner for me? Or has Porky Pendragon here eaten the lot?”

“Insulting my waistline? That’s a low blow, even for you, Merlin,” said Arthur, with a scowl. He pulled on his coat. “I suppose that you’re just not bright enough to think of anything more inventive. Which is presumably why you spend your weekends being vomited on, and removing foreign objects from people’s arses.”

“Huh! Even I’m not qualified to remove that stick from up your arse,” retorted Merlin, feeling the colour rising up his cheeks. “And anyway, unlike you rapacious lawyers, some of us care enough about our clients to look after them at weekends. But of course, I forgot. You only cater for disgusting capitalist slime and corporate criminals, no doubt they’ll all be off on their yachts.”

A little stab of triumph licked into his gut when Arthur opened his mouth to defend himself, and then closed it again, turning his head away, a flash of misery crossing his face. So that still struck home, then. Arthur had never felt completely comfortable working for his father, for corporate clients.

“Of course we saved you some, love,” said Hunith, frowning at him. “Help yourself. Tell me where the box is and I’ll get it while you tuck in. But, please, boys, try to stop arguing. I don’t like it.”

“It’s in my wardrobe,” said Merlin, shovelling a couple of dollops of pie onto his plate. “Under all the hoodies.”

Hunith nodded and left the room, closing the door quietly behind her. Arthur just stood next to the door with his coat on, shoulders tense, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Giving Arthur a cold look that he hoped conveyed his utter indifference to the gorgeous prat, Merlin forked a couple of mouthfuls of dinner into his mouth, but his appetite was much diminished. He pushed the peas around for a moment or two in a desultory fashion while he tried to avoid meeting Arthur’s eyes, and then he dropped the fork. It was no good. He couldn’t swallow, not when there was a treacherous lump in his throat and his pulse was jumping around. He’d eat later, when Arthur had gone.

“Go on, Merlin,” said Arthur, leaning against the door frame with a smirk. “Eat your dinner. You look like a puff of wind would blow you away. Obviously that new boyfriend of yours hasn’t been doing you any good.”

“I’m perfectly able to look after myself,” said Merlin, and then his brain caught up with his mouth. “What boyfriend?”

“Don’t act the innocent with me.” Arthur’s mouth narrowed, and the intensity of his stare deepened. “You know perfectly well what boyfriend. The one you’ve been texting in secret for months. No doubt he’s happy to have you all to himself.”

“I don’t know what you mean.” Merlin crossed his arms. What the fuck was Arthur talking about?

“Oh, really,” drawled Arthur. “So, all those emails on your phone from HM Prison Wakefield don’t ring a bell, then? Although really your taste in men doesn’t seem to have improved much. Scraping the bottom of the barrel, aren’t we?”

A cold dread seeped into his bones, with heat and rage in its wake. Had Arthur been reading his messages? He leaped to his feet, waggling his finger.

“You… you… you suspicious bastard! That was private!” shouted Merlin. “Is that what all this has been about? What the fuck, Arthur? Didn’t you trust me?”

“Why the fuck should I trust you?” Arthur’s face twisted with a sudden anger, and he pushed a chair over so that it fell with a clatter onto the bare tiles. “You were seeing him behind my back.”

“Shut the fuck up, Arthur,” yelled Merlin, banging the table for emphasis. “You don’t know fuck.”

“Oh really? Then enlighten me, Merlin.”

Merlin swallowed, gazing up at the ceiling. Above their heads, creaking floorboards and muffled thumps indicated that his mother was rummaging around in his wardrobe, no doubt hoping to give them some time to sort things out, and this was so fucked up, but he couldn’t let her know, it would destroy her, so he lowered his voice.

“He’s my father,” he said, bitterness making his voice shake. “Balinor. He’s in prison. Bloody drugs. And he is… is… my father. Not my boyfriend. And you had no fucking right to read my emails, none at all. And don’t you tell my mother, because if you do, then I will fucking kill you.”

Merlin had been so excited at first. Hearing from his dad out of the blue, like that. But meeting him had been a grave disappointment. Balinor had begged him for money, and for drugs. It had been months, now, since the last time Balinor had sent him any messages at all, and the worst part of that was that Merlin was relieved. He assumed that Balinor had fallen into a drug-related hole, and part of him wished that he would stay there.

“Merlin I….” It wasn’t often that Arthur was at a loss for words. “I’m sorry. Fuck. I’m sorry I doubted you. But why didn’t you tell me? We were partners, lovers, but above all we were friends. You should have said something. Friends don’t keep secrets.”

“Oh really?” Merlin spat out the words. “Says the man who’s been keeping a box of love letters in his wardrobe for our entire fucking relationship.”

“Love letters.” Arthur’s jaw worked furiously. “So that’s what you think.”

“What else am I to think?”

Just then, the door opened and they both fell silent as Hunith walked in with the box, putting it on the table in front of Arthur.

“Here you are, Arthur,” she said.

“Thanks Hunith.” Arthur’s brooding eyes remained trained on Merlin.

“You’re welcome. Now, I’m just popping out to the shops.” She reached under the sink, retrieving her shopping bag with a too-bright smile.

“I’ll go, mum,” said Merlin.

“I’m just leaving,” said Arthur at the same time. “I’ll give you a lift.”

“No, no!” she said, sharply. “I think you both have a lot to talk about. Arthur, I don’t want you to leave until you have both apologised to each other. I don’t know a lot about law, or medicine, but I have lived through a failed marriage. And what you two shared was nothing like that. I don’t know what went wrong between you, but I do know that the two of you were meant the world to each other, and life is too short to throw away that sort of relationship.”

And with that parting shot, she stalked out of the house, her heels tap tapping on the wooden floor in the hallway, leaving silence in her wake.

Arthur was the first to break it. He rummaged in the box, and brought out a letter. Fingering it gently, he looked up at Merlin and passed it to him.

“Here. Read it,” he said, lifting his eyebrows and waggling the envelope. “Go on!”

“What?” Mouth dry, Merlin shook his head. He didn’t want to read about how some long-forgotten love of Arthur’s missed him. “I can’t.”

“Go on. Maybe it will help.” Inexplicably, Arthur’s glare had been replaced by a soft-eyed expression. “Your mother is right. We shouldn’t be bitter with each other.”

Sometimes, just sometimes, Merlin hated Arthur. And sometimes, just sometimes, it was easier just to do what the prat wanted, even though he knew it was going to hurt.

Swallowing, Merlin took the envelope with a trembling hand. “Arthur Pendragon, Aged 6. Do Not Open until your 6th Birthday!!” it stated. It was a jolly shade of blue, with balloons on it, like the sort of envelope that you would wrap a child’s birthday card in. Which is what he withdrew, with two fingers. The card itself showed a picture of a footballer, and its edges were slightly frayed, as if much handled by grubby thumbs. Merlin glanced up, incredulous.

“Read it.” Arthur’s eyes opened wide when he nodded.

 

> _My dearest boy,_
> 
> _By the time you read this, it will all be over. I know you will be brave and strong, dear one. It is all right to cry, a little bit, don’t let your silly daddy tell you otherwise. But then play and laugh and have a fabulous birthday. Six already! How time flies! I love you always._
> 
> _Mum xxxxxx_

“Arthur, I—” Merlin shook his head and let out a sigh. “Your mother – but she died?”

“She died when I was five,” said Arthur, reaching for the card and replacing it in the box. He flashed Merlin a sad smile. “Cancer. When she knew she was going to die, she wrote me birthday cards, one for each year until I was eighteen. I kept them all. Opened them on each birthday. Listened to her favourite music each time. It made me feel close to her, reading her words in her writing.”

“Arthur.” Merlin’s breath hitched and the lump in his throat grew larger. His eyes felt hot.

“I don’t really listen to this any more.” Arthur picked the tape cassette out of the box, holding it up to the light. “Elvis’s _Love Letters_. I’ve got Elvis’s songs on my phone, now. I can listen to them whenever I want. But I kept the tape, because she recorded it. She left me a message on it, too. I used to like listening to her voice.”

“That’s why you kept that old tape player.” Suddenly, Merlin was beginning to understand things about Arthur that had always mystified him. “Oh, God, Arthur. You never said.”

“It would have been awkward, Merlin,” said Arthur, gently prising the envelope from Merlin’s fingers, replacing the card in it and putting it back in the box. His eyes were wide and suddenly very blue, and he looked so young and earnest when he talked about his mother. “She died a long time ago. And the letters ended on my eighteenth birthday. Except one. There’s one letter I haven’t opened yet. The one she wrote for my thirty-fourth birthday. She was thirty-three when she died. That’s the one I really wanted to have back. So I can read it on my birthday. So now you know my dirty secret. No doubt you’ll be laughing at me for being such a sentimental idiot as soon as my back’s turned.” Abruptly, he stood, pushing the chair back so that it scraped the floor loudly. “Talking of which, I’ve got to get back.”

“I would never laugh at anything so important. I don’t know how you can think that of me.” Merlin bit his lip, fighting a sudden inappropriate urge to put his arms around Arthur and hold him tight. “I’m sorry,” he blurted out thickly, vision blurring.

Arthur paused for a bit with his hand on the door and turned back, fingers tapping on the wooden frame.

“Me too,” he said, quietly. He nodded, once, with an air of finality. “Take care, Merlin.” His footsteps were quiet and when he closed the front door with a click, only a lingering smell of cooling pie, and the tear that spilled onto Merlin's cheek despite all his best efforts to blink it back, remained to show that he had ever been there. 

 

 

***

 

On his thirty-fourth birthday, Arthur declined everyone’s attempts to make him come out drinking. It was a Saturday, so he’d been intending to go, but then he saw a Mini Cooper and his appetite for beer suddenly declined.

Arthur’s flat was located in an unfashionable part of north London, in a 1960s concrete monstrosity at the bottom of a steep hill. It wasn’t as nice as the little Camden Victorian conversion he’d shared with Merlin, but at least it was his. On their way home from football that afternoon, he and Leon walked together along his street from Archway tube station, and paused at the bottom of the steps outside, collars turned up against the chill winter air. Oblivious traffic rumbled past, one vehicle at a time, dodging the parked cars that lined the street.

It was when they stopped that Arthur noticed the dark green Mini Cooper parked up the hill, and he shivered. It was just like Merlin’s mum’s car – although, from this angle, he couldn’t see whether a Welsh flag adorned its roof. And that’s when his post-football bubble started to deflate in earnest.

“You still all right for later, mate?” said Leon.

A sudden powerful melancholy descended on Arthur. It was all that Mini’s fault; now his imagination had started to picture Merlin sauntering down the hill and loitering on his doorstep, face buried in some ridiculous scarf, ears pinking in the cold. The very thought made him ache. Merlin would never come.

That stupid break-up had been a massive mistake, although he still felt sore that Merlin hadn’t confided in him. When he’d left their Camden flat, that day, weeks ago, emptiness had carved a great chunk out of Arthur’s heart – and there the void remained, a bitter and lonely thing. But a stubborn part of Arthur couldn’t help thinking that Merlin was better off without him. Now that Arthur was unemployed, estranged from his father – well, he wasn’t exactly a catch, not any more. He let out a deep sigh. There he was, thirty four years old, unemployed, single and heart-broken. Hardly at the peak of eligibility.

“Mate?” Leon repeated, peering at Arthur. “Are you okay?”

“Nah,” said Arthur, swallowing. “Not feeling a hundred percent, actually. I think I’ll pass, thanks. Feeling a bit— erm. Off. So. Sorry to let you down at the last minute.”

“If you’re sure, mate.” With a sympathetic shrug, Leon clapped him on the shoulder. “Is this about the job, and your dad? Maybe a night out’s what you need? Take your mind of things, you know. Plus, Morgana will kill me if she thinks I’ve left you brooding.”

“Nah, mate,” said Arthur, forcing a smile. “I’ll be okay, don’t worry. I just don’t fancy it, that’s all. Just a quiet one for me. Maybe I’ll get in a take-away, and catch up on some stuff on Netflix.”

“Sure?” Leon frowned. “Well. Let us know if you change your mind. Morgana and I’ll be in The Rising Sun with Gwen and Els for a couple, then we’re off to The Taj Mahal. Not the Fat Buddha. You know how particular Elyan is about his jalfrezi.”

“No worries. Maybe I’ll join you later,” said Arthur, rummaging in his pocket for his keys. He had no intention of doing so, and from his face Leon knew it.

“Yeah, right.” Leon’s answering nod conveyed his full understanding. “See you then.” He turned and headed off, hands in pockets, up the hill towards the street where he and Morgana lived.

They would all put his absence down to the fact that he was jobless and soon to be homeless after the recent argument with his father. But it wasn’t his estrangement with Uther that was bothering him – no, quite the opposite. His new-found freedom was the best thing in his life at the moment. In reality, he just wanted to stay in with a cup of hot cocoa and the final letter from his mother, brooding about Merlin. And these weren’t things that he felt comfortable chatting to Leon or his sister about.

He trudged back up the staircase to the third floor, feet tap-tapping on the lino, grabbing the mail on his way past his mailbox. There were a couple of things in there that looked like birthday cards as well as the usual round of advertisements for lightning fast broadband and pizza. His own hallway was carpeted, muting the sounds of his entry, and he dropped the mail on the kitchen table right next to the box of his mother’s letters, which he had picked up from Wales only a week ago. It had been sitting in pride of place here ever since.

At least here, in the privacy and quiet of his own flat, he could wallow in his own sentimentality without fear of ridicule. Before opening anything he made himself a cup of tea and searched through his _iTunes_ for Elvis’s _Love Letters._ It was something that he and his mother had listened to together, on his fifth birthday, and Elvis’s voice had always reminded him of her.

As Elvis sang, in a ritual that he hadn’t followed since he was eighteen, Arthur turned to his mother’s birthday letter first.

 _Love letters straight from your heart,_ Arthur sang along.

Flipping open the box lid, he rifled through the envelopes before drawing out the only remaining one. Smiling grimly, he fingered it.

_Keep us so near while apart_

Arthur’s name on the front of the envelope was written in a shaky hand. He imagined that his mother had been close to the end when she had written this one, although he never knew that for sure. He had never told his father about the letters, not even once in all these years, they had been his secret, his special tie to his mother throughout his childhood, something that his father couldn’t spoil or break or forbid. He’d been almost superstitious about keeping them hidden, as if by revealing them he would somehow dilute the strength of the tie. Well, now Merlin knew. But somehow the pull of the letters was as strong as ever.

_I'm not alone in the night, when I can have all the love you write_

He swept his thumb along the rough edges of the envelope, faded pale blue, almost grey by the dim light in the kitchen. Ran a finger across the writing. Imagined Ygraine, pale and gaunt, her golden hair gone, sitting up in bed to write it. This, her final communication with her adult son. He had very little memory of her final days in the hospice; it had been a sad place, despite all the ways that the staff had contrived to make it jolly with music and flowers. It had been full of strange smells and stressed adults, and she had looked weird, not like his mother any more, like she was a ghost already. He could remember her hands, though. So thin and bony, but still elegant somehow. And her smile.

_I memorize every line, And I kiss the name that you sign_

“Thank you, mum,” he said, softly. He drew a breath and, standing, took a knife from the drawer. With shaking fingers, he inserted its blade beneath the flap of the final envelope.

It was a short message, sketched out on lined, blue paper in uneven handwriting that spilled over the lines as if to emphasise the emotion behind the words.

 

> _My darling Arthur,_
> 
> _By now you are older than I ever will be. I find it hard to imagine the tall, strong man that you have become, but I do know this, that am so proud of you, my darling son. I can offer you little wisdom that you will not have already gained. But I do have the privilege of perspective. All I can say to you is this. Hold on tight to those that you love, and love them fiercely. Don’t let them drift away through pride, misunderstanding or doubt. For one day they will be wrenched from you, and then it will be too late. But of course you know that, Arthur._
> 
> _It won’t be long now before my time is over. I think I am ready. I am not afraid._
> 
> _Know that my love goes with you always,_
> 
> _Ygraine Pendragon x_

She’d signed it with her name, adult to adult, rather than _Mum_ as with earlier letters. Perhaps to symbolise that by simply staying alive for longer than she had, he had surpassed her in some way. But it didn’t feel like that. The wisdom and pain hidden in her words cut deep, and he let out a shaky breath. _Hold on tight to those that you love._ What a terrible job he had done of that.

His eyes burned hot and his throat closed as regret washed over him. And it wasn’t his father that he was thinking of. No, it’ wasn’t his recent estrangement from Uther that rammed into his chest and clawed at his throat. There had been no misunderstanding there. It was Merlin whose face he saw when he closed his eyes to steady his breathing. Merlin, whom he had loved and let drift away.

_And darling, then I read again right from the start_

_Love letters straight from your heart_

His voice wavered as he sang the final lines of the song, eyes blurring as he read through his mother’s words one more time.

“I’m sorry, Mum,” he said, out loud. “It seems that I’ve failed.”

Elvis’s voice faded away with the final chords of the song. Swallowing, Arthur passed a hand across his face and then turned to the pile of assorted junk mail and cards with a sigh.

*

The first envelope to catch his eye had been hand delivered, it had no stamp on it. It also had the words “Arthur Pratface” scrawled upon it in unmistakably dreadful handwriting. A powerful sense of anticipation made his heart skip.

“It’s a good thing you’re a doctor, Merlin,” he said, smiling despite himself as he tore into the envelope. “They would never have accepted you into any other profession with handwriting like that.” Warmth spread through him at the incongruous thought of passionate, impetuous Merlin as a lawyer.

A card fell out, and a data stick. The card had a picture of a dragon on it (of course!) and inside, in Merlin’s illegible scrawl, a virtually unreadable message. With the eye of faith, and the long experience gained from seven mostly, if Arthur could only admit it, blissful years cohabitation, it might have said:

_if the answer to any of these question is yes, call me_

“Making as much sense as usual, I see,” muttered Arthur. “I suppose I had better find out what you’re blithering on about.” With a put-upon sigh that he didn’t mean, he flipped open the top of his laptop and switched it on, waiting for a few minutes to insert the data stick.

He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised, really, that it was Elvis’s voice that crooned to him through the speakers again, this time asking him if he was lonesome tonight.

 

> _Are you lonesome tonight,_
> 
> _Do you miss me tonight?_
> 
> _Are you sorry we drifted apart?_
> 
> _Does your memory stray to a bright sunny day_
> 
> _When I kissed you and called you sweetheart?_
> 
> _Do the chairs in your parlor seem empty and bare?_
> 
> _Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there?_
> 
> _Is your heart filled with pain, shall I come back again?_
> 
> _Tell me dear, are you lonesome tonight?_

Smiling so hard that it made his face hurt, Arthur flicked open his phone and typed in a message.

_Merlin. I just got a card saying “If the asswork to ay of these bosuns is yen, call e.” Is it anything to do with you?_

A moment later his phone beeped. The return message said

_look outside clotpoll_

His heart thumped a tattoo out against his rib cage as he peered out through the blinds into the street below. Sure enough, the Mini Cooper he’d seen earlier was still there, and from this angle he could see the flag on its roof, a red dragon with one claw lifted in salute. Although he couldn’t see the rear bumper, Arthur knew it sported a sticker bearing the legend “Whinny if you love dragons”.

Sitting on the bonnet, phone in hand, was Merlin. As Arthur watched, Merlin lifted his phone and smiled. It was just about the best birthday present he’d ever received.

Looking back down at his phone, Arthur typed another message.

_if flipping me the bird and called me turnip head counts as kissing me and calling me sweetheart then yes to all of them_

The smile on Merlin’s face when he looked up from his phone again was so blinding in its brilliance that it made Arthur’s ribs hurt.

*

It was strange to see Merlin on the doorstep of his flat, to beckon him across the threshold and into the dingy hallspace. But the smell of Merlin’s skin when he pressed his nose to the favourite part of his neck, just behind his jaw, that was not strange at all. So familiar and dear, it made longing fizz through his veins like a drug.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, pulling Merlin in closer so that the stammer of Merlin’s heart fluttered against Arthur’s ribcage. “I should have trusted you.”

“Me too,” said Merlin softly, drawing in a stuttering breath that was half a sob. His sudden exhale gusted against Arthur’s ear like a caress. “Missed you so much.”

Arthur swallowed. Maybe Merlin wouldn’t be missing him quite so much if he realised what a dead-beat he’d become.

“Stop it,” said Merlin.

“Stop?” Arthur started to draw back. “Fuck, I presumed. Look I’m sorry, I—”

“Not that, you turnip-head.” With strong fingers, Merlin gripped Arthur’s shoulders, pulling him back in until their foreheads were touching. “Stop over-thinking. I can hear the cogs whirring from here. I miss you so much. I want to come back. Ealdor is nice and all, but I miss this.” Tilting his head to one side, he angled his jaw so that their lips met for a brief, chaste kiss. “Miss you.”

“Sure?” Arthur shrugged away Merlin’s hands from his shoulders so that he could step forward and wrap his arms round that skinny waist, tracing the lines of Merlin’s body with his hands. Merlin’s hips were just as slender as Arthur’s hands remembered, and his shoulders as bony. “I’m a bit washed up at the moment. Looking for work, looking for somewhere to live—”

“What? You quit your job?” An incredulous smile played around Merlin’s lips. “Wow! Uther must have been furious.”

“Yeah, but it was worth it.” Arthur grinned back, warmth blooming behind his ribs. From the kitchen, he could vaguely hear Elvis singing _Love me tender_. “Oh, and I told one of Uther’s clients that I could not, in all conscience, defend a selfish, blood-sucking prick like him and that he deserved whatever he had coming to him. Terribly unprofessional, but it felt great.”

“You did?” Merlin’s eyes were round and admiring, and he let out a delighted chuckle. “Oh, my God! You’re brilliant! I'm so proud of you! I wish I’d been there!”

The praise threatened to overwhelm his equilibrium, and without another thought Arthur pressed their mouths together, and their hips. This time the kiss was far from chaste.

“Idiot,” he murmured into Merlin’s mouth.

“Clotpoll,” Merlin replied with a groan that sent a surge of heat crashing into Arthur’s gut.

 

*

 

 _I’ll be yours through all the years til the end of time,_ echoed Elvis’s voice through the hallway and into the bedroom.

But by then, no-one was listening.

 

***

 

THE END

 

**Author's Note:**

> Rated teen and up for mild profanity. With enormous thanks to the ever wonderful Tari_Sue for the lightning-fast beta.  
> Disclaimer: Not my characters, I'm not getting paid.


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